He lifted his hand from the back of the seat and raised a single soft curl from her temple. Pausing, he gave her the chance to object.
She didn’t.
“I have no idea how we were paired. You must’ve answered the questionnaire with great care to land such a catch.”
Her eyes sparkled despite the dim lighting. “Or you did.”
The laugh caught him off guard as it rushed up from somewhere deep and all but inaccessible. He reveled in the endorphin rush. When was the last time he’d laughed like this? The sobering thought tamped down the laughter, though not before he caught the surprise on her face. “You’re right,” he murmured, twisting the curl with care around his forefinger. “Perhaps it was I who answered with more than a little luck.”
But he hadn’t.
He had rushed through the questionnaire, giving it less than even half-assed answers. He’d had no intention of finding a potential partner. Not even a partner for a single evening. He’d been helping his little brother. Nothing more. But to admit as much to Rachel would be to insult her, to say that his thoughtless answers paired him with such an interesting woman while hers paired her with a man who didn’t give a shit. So he shrugged. “The program was created to dig deeper, to find the common ground that superficial assessments miss. Perhaps there’s more to this thing between us than simple chemistry.”
“In my experience, chemistry—true chemistry—is rarely simple.”
“Then maybe the program’s doing exactly what it was designed to do.” He tugged gently on her curl, his pulse thundering through his head louder and louder as she voluntarily moved into his space. His hand. His touch.
“It’s important to me that you know I didn’t come with you tonight based on your net worth. I couldn’t care less, Isaac.”
“Trust me. If I thought otherwise, you wouldn’t be here right now.”
“You’re the second person to tell me to trust them tonight.”
“So I am.” He let go of her curl, watching it gently bounce back. Then he asked, “What do you want, Rachel? What do you truly want out of this evening?”
“A promise.”
His hackles rose, and she laughed out loud. “Nothing like that. All I want is the guarantee that, whatever happens, it’s all consensual, no strings attached, and we part ways on good terms with no expectations for anything more.”
“Thank God.” He laughed then, entirely self-deprecating.
Rachel smiled, the look a soft one she hadn’t shared until that moment.
“What?”
“You don’t laugh much, do you?” More observation than question.
“I don’t typically find much to laugh about.” The admission made him sound cold, even callous, to his own ears, but before he could expound on the statement, she responded.
“Then you’re not looking.”
That stung, and he snapped back without thinking. “A bit presumptuous, don’t you think?”
She seemed entirely unfazed, blowing off his little spew of temper without comment. “Do you have an executive assistant?”
“Now you’re answering questions with questions?”
“Irritating...isn’t it?” She gave him a wide and genuine smile.
He snorted and shook his head. “Two.” At her confused look, he clarified. “I have two assistants.”
“Surely one of them could schedule some downtime for you to laugh a little.”
“Is laughter so important to you, then?”
The look in her eyes softened and appeared to be far, far too close to pity for his comfort. But the question that followed her look—thatmade him wince. “Is laughter not important to you at all?”
“I don’t make moneyby scheduling ‘downtime’ or laughing.”